#303: Mentoring Moment: Gradual Clarity

Welcome to Kingdom Writers, where we help equip and empower Christian writers of all genres to share your unique gifts with the world. We're your hosts, C.J. and Shelley Hitz.

This podcast is filled with spiritual encouragement as well as prayers to help you overcome the resistance you face as a writer. Your story matters.

So our theme for today is gradual clarity. And CJ is going to share some encouragement with you as Kingdom Writers. For what? For what God might even have to encourage you today.

Yeah. So as I mentioned, in Mark chapter eight, we find this story that's found nowhere else in the Gospels. It's the only instance where we have this particular.

Healing. And so It's Mark, chapter eight, starting in verse 22. We'll read a few verses here. When they arrived at Bethsaida, some people brought a blind man to Jesus and they begged him to touch the man and heal him. Jesus took the blind man by the hand and led him out of the village. Then, spitting on the man's eyes, he laid his hands on him and asked, can you see anything now? And this is where we get into the idea of gradual clarity. Because listen to the man's response. The man looked around. Yes. He said, I see people, but I can't see them very clearly. They look like trees walking around. You can just imagine this. Then Jesus placed his hands on the man's eyes again, and his eyes were opened, his sight was completely restored, and he could see everything clearly. Jesus sent him away, saying, don't go back into the village on your way home. And so here we have what we might even refer to as a two part miracle. It came in two stages. And, you know, it would have been nice, you know, for the man to have received instant clarity.

I think the man, in many ways, represents you and I. I think that many times we. We go through life and we initially come to Christ, we surrender our lives to him. But how many know that salvation is a process, sanctification is a process that many times we go through life seeing things, like we're looking at trees and we wonder, why can't I just have instant clarity? Help me, Lord. And it could be with my book. It could be with an issue I'm having with a family member. It could be a number of things, and we don't know why. Experts.

Only speculate on why would this happen. You know, was Jesus practicing his healing of blind men? You know, was. Was he kind of like, not it Was he. Was he a little rusty? You know, why do some things happen instantly and some things happen gradually? We don't know. We do know this is the only instance in the Gospels where this particular two part healing took place. You don't see it in Matthew, Luke or John and this whole spitting idea. You know, how many know that there are going to be times when God asks us to do something and the way he gets us there is a little unorthodox. It's a little bit out of the ordinary. It may be something that catches us off guard. There may be even something in our books that we write that we're like, oh, I didn't expect this, I didn't expect this insight to come. Or as many of you have said, you get started and eventually the story unfolds, or an idea unfolds. It, it develops over time and by the end you're just looking at this and you do have 20, 20 hinds, 2020. And so I want to say today that we're all in process. Many of us may come to this virtual writing retreat this morning just seeing trees, some rough trees. It's like people walking around. And maybe you're even in a place where your book right now just seems like, it just seems like a tree walking around and you're just, you can't really make out the, you're. There's still a fogginess.

Or maybe you feel completely blind this morning and you just feel like, I don't have any clarity yet. I just, I need God to show me the next step.

We do know from Isaiah, there's, there's a few passages.

That foretell that one of the, one of the miracles that the Messiah of God would perform would be the opening of blind eyes. And so we know that by Jesus doing this, he is fulfilling prophecy, one of many, you know, that we could just sit here and name in terms of all the prophecies he fulfilled. I find it ironic though that a few verses before Jesus is talking about the blind Pharisees, the spiritually blind Pharisees and religious leaders. Now he does this miracle that is gradual, it's two part. It's almost as if he's symbolizing the fact that many of these Pharisees are walking around spiritually blind. And they think that they have clarity, but they don't. They just start seeing things like trees. But then after this story, what do we have? We have Jesus sitting down with his disciples and Peter making that fearless declaration after Jesus asked his disciples, who do people say I am? And now who do you say I am? And Jesus just, or Peter just blurts out like he always does. He just blurts out and says, you, you're the Messiah. You are the Messiah. He declared it. And Jesus didn't correct him. Jesus gave that to Peter and even said that my Father revealed this to you. And so isn't it interesting that.

Peter had the clarity of mind and heart and spirit to say, I know you're the Messiah. And today, you know, Jesus asks us to come to him and posture ourselves before him to give our blindness to him, to give our haziness to him. And we may not receive exactly what we want in the timing that we want. It may not be instantaneous. This may be a two part process over the course of these next two days. He's going to begin by giving you some, some vision. You can now see trees walking around. That was a lot more than seeing pitch black just, just a second before. But it may be that into tomorrow the Lord might give you that, that he might give you more and more clarity and you endeavor to sit down, posture yourself before him. I'm here at this writing retreat. I don't understand exactly what's going to happen, but I know something good is going to take place because I put myself here in front of Jesus. He's going to do things that may seem just a little unorthodox, might be spitting on your eyes. It's not a cruel thing. It's Jesus's way of going about.

Performing the miracle in all of our hearts. And so as you do that, just know that the Lord does want to give you clarity. It just may be a little different than the way you imagined.

Yeah, and you know, Jesus never healed someone the exact same way. You know that in the, the gospels that we have, I mean, they said, John said if he would have included all the stories of Jesus, that would, you know, wouldn't have filled all the, or it would have, wouldn't have fit in all the books of the world. But, you know, every one of you may have a different experience as you're writing your book, and you probably will. Your experience is not going to be exactly like mine or CJ's or Heather's or Pam's or Edwina's or Nancy's. You know, we all are in a different place. We all have different personalities. And, you know, the Lord is going to do things with us differently. And so I always recommend don't shove a round peg in a square hole. Because you know, the Lord may have something completely different for your holiday book marketing strategies than what I, you know, taught you. You know, in the workshop this week and that's cool. Like, you know, do the things that God leads you to do. And many times they're going to be even more successful than just trying to find. Force yourself to do something exactly the way, you know, to write exactly the way. The snowflake method or the, you know, this outlining method or whatever it is, I've got to do it this way. It's like, no, God has clarity for you. He has the next steps for you. And be open to those things that may not make sense, those things that may not be what you've been taught, but that's the way God is leading you to God. So, cj, why don't you pray for all of us as we all are taking these steps? Sometimes we are taking steps blind. I remember God gave me a picture last year when I was skiing. There was actually someone blind skiing in Colorado down these, you know, steep hills and stuff. But they had two people, one on each side, and they had those. The. The people that were with them had, you know, things on them. And their jacket said, blind guide. And the Lord said, shelly, that's what I am for you. Often when you feel blind, I am your guide. So whether or not you feel completely blind this morning, you can still get down that hill with your guides, right? Holy Spirit, God the Father, Jesus, you have guides to lead you, and yet some of you may receive some. Some clarity right now. You may start seeing those trees walking around, and some of you, you may start receiving the next steps of the clarity. And you're. You're. You know, you're just really going along. So wherever you're at, know that God is with you. He's going to lead you, and he's going to guide you, and he is going to give you the clarity. If you will just take those steps of faith. And whether or not you feel completely blind, partially blind, wherever you're at, even if you have complete clarity right now, there may be other things that God's going to reveal to you as you go.

Yeah. Father, we thank you so much again for just these stories that are tucked away in your word. I just thank you, Lord, for this one that we see that it's a. It's kind of a gradual process in this particular healing that unlike many of your others that were instant, I believe that there was. That this was really meant to be a symbol in terms of us and our growth spiritually and the things that we see. And we just. Thank you, Lord. I pray that you would specifically work through each one of these kingdom writers today and into tomorrow. I pray that, that they would walk away with some clarity, that they would walk away being able to see 2020 on what you've been doing, what you're up to, the reasons things are happening the way they are in their lives. And we just pray, Lord, that you would bring inspiration, that you'd fill each one with your Holy Spirit. We command the enemy and all of his forces to flee in Jesus name. All the lies, all the confusion, we just say flee in Jesus name. And we thank you Lord, for what you're going to do, the victories that you're going to bring about today and tomorrow, even just the ways that we get more organized. We know that's a huge victory. Many times we can organize our thoughts and be prepared in, in a way that we weren't just a few minutes before. I just pray that everything would come together the way you desire for each of these kingdom writers. And we ask this in Jesus name. Amen.

Amen.

And one of the things I forgot to read, I wanted to read a, just a quick verse, First Corinthians 1. One of you alluded to it, I believe in one of your comments. But first Corinthians 13:12. Now we see things imperfectly, like puzzling reflections in a mirror. But then when is then when we stand before the Lord, when we're in his presence.

Then we will see everything with perfect clarity. All that I know now is partial and incomplete. But then I will know everything completely, just as God now knows me completely. And that just brings me comfort because right now things do seem, do seem dim. And I do believe that.

Many of us will, will pass away.

Unless the Lord should the Lord tarry. But many of us may pass away not fully completing something that we just thought sure we were going to complete. But I just believe that when we stand before the Lord.

He'S going to show us so clearly that all of it was a process and that we.

We'Re obedient to what he called us to. And everything will be clear at that point. We won't have, oh, I wish I would have done this or that. It'll just be, the Lord was working a piece of art in our lives and so we're working toward that. Right now. Things look dim, things look a little unclear, but there's going to come a day when it just won't matter anymore. What will matter is we're instantly in clarity and in sync with the Lord. And that's, that's a, that's a comforting feeling for me because I know that there are going to be things undone in my life. They're just. They just are. And yet, I don't fret. I say one day it's all going to become crystal clear and I will have done what I needed to do.

Yes. Amen. So good. Well, I hope that this encouraged you, that even if you're feeling blind or that you have partial clarity today, God is with you. He's going to lead you and guide you, and one day we will have perfect clarity. Amen.

Thank you for listening to this episode of Clarity. Kingdom writers, we believe that you, as a Christian writer, have a specific role to play in the Kingdom of Heaven to impact lives for eternity.

And because of this, we choose to pour out our lives into encouraging writers like you to not only tell your stories, but to take the courageous step of self publishing your stories in books that will outlive you and leave behind a powerful legacy. This podcast is sponsored by Christian Book Academy, where we help you give birth to your books. We invite you to join our community of Kingdom writers.